Roots: The concept of Auld Mortality may spring from the tradition
of Roman emperors being told upon their Triumph by a slave that they are only mortal.
Hannibal's journey over the Alps (with a few historical embellishments)
Christmas stories (the story's mentions of the Gallifreyan Othermass -
Auld Mortality is an Auld Acquaintance of the Doctor, harking back to the
feast of Steven.") Star Trek's holodeck stories - creating artificial
realities with entities that become self-aware. Star Trek: TNG - Badger's
positronic brain. Mervin Peakes' Gormenghast Trilogy - The Doctor's
strange household and his abdication from the responsibilities of Leadership
forced on him by his family - Badger is very similar to a character from
the Peake novella 'The Boy in the Darkness' that slots in between the first
two books. Old Mortality by Sir Walter Scott. Sapphire and Steel
(Auld Mortality hiding in every painting of the Presidential Inauguration,
sometimes only a shadow) Sophie's World (running away into the
infinite possibilities of the imagination and questioning of what is real)

Intertextuality: Quences, Badger and most of the other mythology
come straight from Marc Platt's novel 'Lungbarrow'. 'An Exciting Adventure
with the Hassites' recalls 'An Exciting Adventure with the Daleks', while
'A Journey to...' recalls 'A Journey to Cathay', the original title to
'Marco Polo'. The Doctor's final line paraphrases William Hartnell's line
at the close of 'The Feast of Stephen'. The reference to a foggy night
on Barnes Common comes directly from David Whitaker's novelisation of the
first Dalek story.

Goofs: If Quences is non-corporeal how is he able to play chequers?
[It's voice controlled - more to the point, the Doctor's dialogue suggests
Quences recently regenerated?!]

The air was thick with (silent) carrion birds.

Technobabble: The Aurora Temporalis - The Anvils of heaven from
which all time springs

'Just like you to make a fool of the whole Family. Arse over ceremonial
tit in front of the Lordships!'

'I'm a ghost, my disposition is permanently chilly.'

'Don't just assume things only go wrong because God didn't do his research.'

Dialogue Disasters: The very French Gaul accent.

'Grandfather - He's controlling you!' - duh!

'I will feed you to the dogs!' 'Only the dogs! Oh dear, oh dear.'

Continuity: WHAT IF...the Doctor and Susan never left Gallifrey?

'Auld Mortality' is a reoccurring dark presence that haunted the presidents
of Gallifrey, reminding them that death is never far away. The Auld Mortalities
want a president it can completely control.

Few Presidents seem to reach a second term (or even a second regeneration.)
once they have outlived their uses. Of former Gallifreyan heads of state,
President Cholem died from slipping on the Panopticon steps and splitting
his head open. President Rosieh was poisoned by his own food taster. Precept
the Second died from a paper-cut at an archivists' supper. No one knows
what an Ordinal-General does; possibly it is archaic flimflam like Almina
Crest or Able Gread.

There was a fungal coup on Esto, steep rise in the price of soul in Mephisto
Regions. Half of the galaxy have fallen to the Thalek Empire [presumably
an alternative outcome of the Dalek/Thal war], whose war cry is "Annihilate!"

The Daily Presidential Bulletins come in paper form (and can be ironed.)
And there are still door-to-door hawkers and circulars. In this universe
a Supreme Council rather than a High one governs Gallifrey. As well Prydron
Academy Gallifreyan records can be obtained from the Bureau of Political
Advancement, The Temple of Capital Guilds, and the Office of Public Registry.
Transmats are in common use.

Auld Mortality made the Doctor into a writer of adventures of a traveller
in Time and Space, living in his TARDIS (which the Doctor forgot). Some
of the Doctor's adventures include 'A Journey to Ice-Askar, the Winter
Star' and 'An Exciting Adventure with the Hassites'. An Auld Mortality
over the Doctor's great-granduncle, Ordinal-General Quences (whose Deathday
was 13 days after Othermass) who survived by implanting his psyche into
the robot Badger's mind.

The Possibility Generator allows one to engage in a virtual reality. Possibilities
and Imagination are two relative dimensions. The controls for the generator
don't work within it. It doesn't appear to be common on Gallifrey, as Susan
isn't familiar with them, and is probably illegal.

Susan has two grandchildren (a girl and a boy) of her own. She is the
daughter of the Doctor's daughter. The Doctor's birthday is on Othermass.
Othermass celebrations involve giant puppets.

At the end of the story, the Doctor leaves Gallifrey with Susan/without
Susan (who stayed to become the next President of Gallifrey).

Location: Gallifrey

Untelevised Adventures: After leaving Gallifrey the TARDIS takes
on various forms, an old tree stump, an old minaret, a wardrobe, a revolving
door, and an ancient black sarcophagus. The Doctor meets Winston Churchill.

One gets the impression that this story, populated with so many 'established'
aspects of Marc Platt's Who fiction, doesn't ask the above question 'What
if the Doctor never left Gallifrey' rather, 'What if the first Doctor was
played by Geoffrey Bayldon?' Bayldon makes a great Richard Hurndall as
the First Doctor. However Carole Anne Ford makes rather a meal of her returning
role as Susan.